


Breakfast

by tiger_moran



Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms, Sherlock Holmes (Downey films), Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: Breakfast in Bed, Caring, Fluff, Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, Food, Holding Hands, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-15
Updated: 2014-07-15
Packaged: 2018-02-08 21:58:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,771
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1957569
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tiger_moran/pseuds/tiger_moran
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for the fluff prompt: One half of your OTP is sick/injured, so the other gets up early to make the other breakfast, despite the fact that they can not cook to save their life. Fluffiness ensues</p>
            </blockquote>





	Breakfast

   “Unfortunately our trusty housekeeper is away at present so-No, Moran, don’t get up.” Moriarty hurriedly glides towards the bed and deposits the tray on top of Moran’s lap before he can attempt to extricate himself fully from the bed. “So I was obliged to cook breakfast for you myself.”

    “Wondered why you were up so early.” Moran eyes the breakfast tray suspiciously. “What about Fanny?” he queries. Their maid may be a bit clumsy but even she probably makes a better breakfast than the professor.

    “She has a cold, so I insisted she stay well away from you and your meals. In your condition I will not risk exposing you to her.”

    “I’ve got a broken arm and a couple of cracked ribs, is all,” Moran points out. “I ain’t about to snuff it.” He pokes at the rashers of bacon with a fork with his one good hand.

    “Nonetheless…” Moriarty leans over him, carefully tucking a napkin into the neck of Moran’s nightshirt. “I won’t have her coughing and sneezing into your food.” He notices how Moran is still prodding at the bacon. “Something wrong, Sebastian?”

    “No sir, it’s just… well don’t you think it’s a tad overdone?”

    “You like your bacon crisp.”

    “I think perhaps this is just a little… over-crisp.” Ignoring Moriarty’s slight pouting of his lower lip, he spears the sausage next, which seems _slightly_ more promising, being only severely blackened on one side.

    “Do stop playing with your food, Colonel,” Moriarty chides, plucking the fork from Moran’s grasp. “If you cannot manage to eat it properly then I shall have to cut it up for you and feed it to you.” He sits down on the bed beside Moran and begins to cut the sausage into bite-size pieces, though when he attempts to do the same to the bacon it does rather crumble more than cut. “Well… perhaps if you just ate the sausage, egg and toast.”

    “I weren’t sure if that was toast, sir, or bread.”

    “Yes, well I ran out of time to get it nicely golden.”

    “What are the black bits in the-” Moran’s question is cut off by Moriarty shoving a piece of sausage into his mouth. To keep from choking on it he is obliged to chew it thoroughly before swallowing. “Eggs?” he finishes.

   “I suspect that it is ash,” Moriarty answers.

    Moran ponders this for a moment. “Ash?”

    “From when they caught fire.”

    Moran narrows his eyes. “Can eggs do that?”

   “Just eat it, please, and do not ask so many questions. I am a professor of mathematics, not of cookery, and after all with you laid up and our servants out of action I am only doing this out of the kindness of my-” He breaks off, realising what he was about to say.

    “Heart?” Moran grins and even having a forkful of rather crunchy scrambled eggs pushed somewhat abruptly to his lips fails to suppress this. He is still grinning as he eats them, which does largely manage to conceal his grimace at the terrible taste and texture. “Thought you always reckoned you don’t have one?”

    “Well my point is I cannot see you starve. You are still one of my best assets, Colonel.”

    “That I am.” Moran is still grinning as he takes a swallow of coffee. Well at the least the professor hasn’t managed to mess that up. “I do appreciate the effort, Professor.”

    “Hm.” Moriarty only looks slightly mollified by this.

    “May I have some more sausage, please?”

    Moriarty peers at him for a moment before impaling another piece of sausage on the fork and putting it to Moran’s lips. Moran eats it with every sign of willingness, even something almost approximating enjoyment.

    “You don’t have to humour me, you know,” Moriarty remarks. “I am aware that it is absolutely dreadful.”

    Moran shrugs. “I had worse in Afghanistan.”

     Moriarty dabs a spot of grease from the corner of Moran’s mouth with the edge of the napkin. “That was in a war.”

    “Still true.”

    “I had hoped that I would be able to provide you with something rather better than battlefield fare.” The professor lowers his gaze.

    Moran reaches and takes Moriarty’s hand in his own one good hand. “It’s fine, Professor, honestly.”

    “Apart from the bacon.”

    “Well, perhaps…” Moran cannot bring himself to commit to a more thorough condemnation of the bacon now.

    “And the eggs.”

    “The sausage is all right.” _At least ignoring the half of it that has been nearly cremated._ “And there’s nothing wrong with a bit of bread.”

    “Except that it was meant to be toast.”

    “Well, the coffee’s nice, and I reckon the burnt bits’ll help my digestion no end.”

     Moriarty eyes Moran’s face intently for a moment then bursts out laughing. “I am very sorry,” he says, smoothing Moran’s napkin out. “I shall find Tommy and have him fetch you something better.”

    “There’s no need.”

    “Well I can at least go and toast the bread a little more.”

   As Moriarty makes to rise though Moran gently but firmly tugs him back. “Please, Professor, just… sit with me, and put a bit of butter and marmalade on the bread and it’ll be fine as it is.”

    Moriarty remains sitting by the colonel’s side. He threads his fingers through Moran’s and, leaning over slightly, though careful to avoid putting weight against Moran’s injured ribs, he brushes his lips lightly over Moran’s forehead. “You are very long-suffering, pet,” he says softly. “I am not ignorant of the fact that I am not always an easy man to live with.”

    “You’re easier to live with than those toffs in the army at any rate.” Moran smiles. “And believe me, sir, the fact you’re a wretched cook is really the least of my concerns.”

    “I simply wished to take care of you while you are indisposed.” He looks at Moran who seems so pale, even frail, at present, and he recalls his own momentary terror of two days ago when the colonel had been dumped, bloodied and broken, on their doorstep after his beating at the hands of the Malcolm gang. For some seconds it had truly seemed to him that Moran was dead, although the colonel’s muffled cursing soon put an end to that fear. Still, Moran had lost a fair amount of blood from his various other more minor injuries in addition to having his arm and ribs broken, and still it pains Moriarty to see his proud, fierce tiger suffer so. Whilst watching their physician (the best money could procure) set Moran’s broken arm and clean and dress the numerous cuts, the professor had thought up fourteen different ways to repay Malcolm and his lackeys for their ill-treatment of his companion.

    “You do take care of me, Professor,” Moran says. “You always have.”

    This seems to draw the faintest of smiles from the professor as he turns his attention to applying butter and marmalade to a piece of the barely-toasted bread. He holds this to Moran’s mouth and the colonel leans his head forward and takes a bite of it, smiling up at Moriarty with his eyes more than his mouth as he does so. When the whole piece has gone Moriarty lifts his hand to Moran’s chin and brushes a few crumbs from his beard.

    “My dearest Moran.” He lets his hand linger against Moran’s cheek momentarily.

    “Professor.” Moran turns his face and presses a kiss to the professor’s palm. Only after a few seconds have passed does Moriarty slowly lower his hand to rest on the counterpane. “Must you get up yet?” Moran asks.

    “I am already up.”

    “What I mean is… was there some other reason besides preparing breakfast that got you out of bed so early?”

    “Not any particular reason, no.”

    “Then you could come back to bed.”

    “I have already washed and dressed.”

    “You don’t need to undress, I am not proposing we do anything _indecent_.” Moran grins slyly. “Please, sir, I’d just value your company a while longer. I fear lying around waiting to heal will be the death of me unless you figure out some way to occupy me.”

    “My poor pigeon.” Moriarty rises once more but this time only to remove the tray from Moran’s lap. “I shall have to think up something to keep you occupied, but _not_ one-armed target practice.” He recalls one of Moran’s suggestions of the previous day as to how to keep the boredom at bay. “I am not having the walls ruined, thank you.” Tray removed to a safer location, he sits down on the bed and removes his shoes, before carefully settling himself to half lie and half sit beside Moran. “Are you in any pain?”

    “No sir, I’m all right so long as you don’t make me laugh too hard.”

    “I had best not try cooking for you again then.” He would like to put his arm around Moran and draw him closer but with the cracked ribs this is far from being a good idea. He settles for taking Moran’s uninjured hand in his once again and letting them rest, fingers interlinked, upon his abdomen. “If you think it would not overly agitate you…” He recollects how the colonel has reacted to certain other hunting memoirs in the past, with sneering contempt and a lot of cursing at those ‘bloody amateurs’. “I might see later about procuring you some more books, perhaps something about hunting?”

    “Whatever you think I might like.”

    “Or perhaps you should read _The Dynamics of an Asteroid_.” Moriarty gives him another small smile. “It should send you to sleep quite nicely, and you do need your rest.”

    “You could read it to me.” Moran yawns and closes his eyes. “I like to listen to you speak, even if I don’t understand half of what you’re on about.”

    “Perhaps later.” Moriarty glances sideways at Moran, noticing how his chin has tipped down onto his chest. Even his attempt at eating the poor breakfast has seemed to exhaust him. “You could go back to sleep for an hour or two, my dove.”

    “Mm.”

     “I’ll stay here awhile with you, but do sleep if you wish.”

    “Thank you, Professor.” Moran’s words are beginning to slur as he already drifts into a doze.

   Moriarty watches him until any remaining lines of tension and discomfort in Moran’s face smooth out. Satisfied that his lover is peacefully sleeping now, the professor settles himself back upon his pillows and now he puts his mind to a most important issue: contemplating a further seven highly creative ways in which he might enact his revenge upon Mr Alistair Malcolm.


End file.
